


since the beginning of everything

by ObscureReference



Series: TFW [2]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Braces, M/M, Other, Pre-Series, Pre-Slash, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-24
Updated: 2015-09-24
Packaged: 2018-04-23 03:14:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4860932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ObscureReference/pseuds/ObscureReference
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Chris is seven years old and he thinks "soulmate" is the coolest word in the whole wide world."</p><p>Prequel to "That Feel When."</p>
            </blockquote>





	since the beginning of everything

**Author's Note:**

> I made a prequel to 'That Feel When' and I'm surprised it did it as fast as I did. I feel better about it than the last one, though that may be because TFW is just straight up porn. Maybe I'll write a actual sequel to these where Chowder/Dex/Nursey ACTUALLY get together for real if I manage to generate enough ideas and motivation. For now, here's what I got. More ramble-y Chowder.
> 
> Tell me if you see any mistakes and I'll fix them as soon as I can.

Chris is seven years old and he thinks "soulmate" is the coolest word in the whole wide world.

He has one, his mother says. He has someone out there, a person just for him who he is going to love and who will love him back more than anything in the whole wide world.

"Even more than you?" Chris asks, because he loves his mommy so _much_ and it is so very, very hard to imagine loving anyone more than he already loves his mom. That's a lot of love. Chris is very small. He's not sure how big you have to be to make that much love but he doesn't think he's big enough yet.

"Maybe not more," his mother says, bopping his nose with one delicate finger and Chris giggles at the touch. "It's a little different than how you love me or your family or friends. But it's still a whole lot of love."

Chris feels his eyes go huge and his mommy is looking at him in that way she does sometimes, half-smiling. His fingers feel tingly and he's not sure why. Somebody once told him there were, like, a hundred people in the whole world and Chris tried counting that high once but he just didn't have enough fingers to do it. That was so many. A hundred people in the whole wide world and he was gonna love one of them so much it would "make his head spin," his mom said. Golly.

"They're out there right now?" Chowder asks. Just to be sure. He really wants to be sure they're out there. They sound so cool.

"Probably," his mother replies. "And maybe you'll meet them one day."

That "maybe" floats in one ear and out the other and suddenly soulmates are all Chowder can think about for _days,_ which is like a century in elementary school time. He thinks about them in the backyard when he's in the sandbox, wondering if they like making sandcastles or if they like to draw instead. He thinks about them when he's getting ready for school, wanting to know if they don't like combing their hair too or if they're like the Katie down the street who brushes her hair before she gets on her bike and then every time she takes her helmet off. He wonders if they have freckles or if they've lost their teeth yet or if they like Power Rangers as much as him and if they like jumping in puddles on rainy days. He can play inside if his soulmate wants, even if he likes being outside a whole lot. You have to always share, his mom says. He wonders if his soulmate is bigger than him or smaller (Chris is really small already for his age so he doesn't think that's true) or if they like hockey like him and his mom.

He's not sure if he can make it work if they don't like hockey. But then again neither does his grandma and he loves her a lot, so maybe it'll be okay.

(He really, really hopes they like hockey. And sharks.)

\---

Chris is ten and California is not that cold. California does gets cold sometimes, but last week in science class Chris read about climate zones and stuff and how California actually stays pretty warm mostly, but there are places in the world where sometimes it can snow for months and months and freeze everything, even your tongue to a pole, and Chris isn't sure if he's ever seen ice outside his refrigerator or an ice rink before.

 So even though it's October, Chris knows it isn't that cold. Not compared to the rest of the world.

California is not that cold but Chowder is _freezing_ all the time now. The temperature outside isn't even that bad. It's maybe fifty degrees on a really bad day and his birthday is in a week and then he will be _eleven_ and Chris wants to be so much more excited except he's _shivering_ all the time. There have been a couple of days when he's been lucky and it hasn't been that bad and sometimes the chill will suddenly pass and he'll have an hour or two of feeling okay before falling right back in to what feels like ice. But most of the time now he _shakes_ and there are goosebumps _everywhere_ and his cheeks sting from the cold wind that _isn't there_. It's the _worst_ and his mom already checked him and he doesn't feel sick at all but it's so _cold_ like _all the time._ A few of the kids at school were giving him weird looks for breaking out his thicker jackets so early.

"Maybe you're soulmate lives somewhere cold," his mother says.

And that doesn't sound like it has much to do with his shivering problem, so Chris sniffs like he has a runny nose (even though he doesn't, but it feels like it) and looks at his mother expectantly.

"What's that got to do with anything?" He asks. It comes out a little grumpier than he means it to and that makes him feel kind of bad, but he feels kind of bad all over already so he hopes his mother understands.

"It means that," his mother says, handing him another cup of hot chocolate even though it's not even Christmas yet. "Sometimes, when it's a really strong feeling, you can feel what your soulmate feels. So if it's really, really cold where they are, you might be feeling their weather too."

That makes Chris pause for a second. He shivers a little, despite the indoor heat.

"Does that mean they feel just as bad as me?"

"Maybe worse," his mother says. Gently. "Or maybe just the same. It's hard to tell how much transfers over the line sometimes. Usually you only get a little feeling, if it ever comes. Most of the time you don't feel anything at all."

"Though I suspect it must be awfully cold for you to be shaking like this all day long," she adds, giving Chris and his big coat a once over.

And that makes Chowder pause _again_.

Here he's been this whole time, complaining about how cold he is when somewhere out there, somebody was feeling maybe even worse than him. Chris had a heated blanket and big jackets and hot chocolate his mom made. His soulmate maybe didn't have _any_ of that. And when they went outside, they maybe didn't have the sun shining on them so brightly. Maybe they lived in one of those places where it was dark for half the year and they almost never saw the sun. Maybe they went outside and it was cloudy all the time, so they couldn't even lay in the grass to feel warm.

Maybe they had even snow or ice or hail, the way California had sunshine and sometimes rain. And Chris read about hail when he read about climate zones and hail sounded really not fun at all.

Or maybe they _did_ have the sun and jackets and a nice mom like Chris' but they lived some place so cold that none of that mattered anyway.

Chris didn't know which was worse.

He lays in the grass a lot more after that, even though it's warmer inside, because if his soulmate really does live in one of those dark places he hopes they can feel the light on his skin and they can feel a little better about living someplace so dark. When he drinks the hot chocolate his mom makes, he holds it in his mouth an extra long time before swallowing, hoping they can taste the chocolate too, even though it's pretty hot and his mom looks at him funny when his cheeks are all puffed out.

Chris wants to whine about shivering and the icy wind and feeling like he has a runny nose all the time even though he doesn't. But that's not fair to his soulmate, who probably has to go through worse, or to his mom, who is really patient but he suspects complaining all the time isn't fun to listen to, even though she loves him a lot.

Winter drags on and on and on and then one morning Chris wakes up and his nose doesn't feel runny and awful any more. He shivers a little that morning, but it's all gone by the afternoon and Chris lays in the grass extra long that day because maybe he can push the rest of the Winter away somehow if he sends a lot of heat to replace it.

His face is a little pink later, but then spring is here and he's much warmer and he doesn't mind the pink skin because maybe his soulmate will be a lot warmer now too.

\---

Chris is fourteen and he is drowsy, lying in bed. There is sunlight dancing through his window and he wants to roll over to block it out but that would require too much energy. Chris is awfully sleepy.

Also, he is on a boat. He knows he is on a boat because he can feel the boat shift under him, back and forth, back and forth, rocking him like a cradle. It could be so much worse, he knows, like if there was a storm, but right now the sea isn't so bad. Salt lingers on his lips and his eyes are a little gritty from it too. The smell of the sea is strong, especially so far out and it's been a long time since he's smelled anything but the sea. There aren't any seagulls this far out, but maybe the smell of fish will draw some of the courageous ones in. Probably not though.

Also, he is in the city. A big city. Much bigger than most of the small towns in Chris's area. A big city like San Francisco is a big city, but Chris knows he's not in San Francisco. He's somewhere else. Another city. _The_ city. It is loud and bustling and he can feel the shoulders of every person brushing by him, _swish, swish, swish,_ always rubbing shoulders because he is so tall and everything is always pretty cramped and that's how big cities are. Everyone in close quarters. That's how it has always been. The city smells a little like garbage sometimes, but mostly like people. He likes the big city a lot. He has always lived in a big city.

Chris opens his eyes, less drowsy. He is lying in bed. He doesn't know where else he would be.

\---

Chris is sixteen and getting braces and it's. Not exactly scary. But he isn't sure quite what to expect.

He's seen other people get braces and he's heard them tell the stories over and over of how they got theirs; no, it didn't really hurt, yeah, it was kind of sore after, it feels a little funny at first but you get used to it, they have to make your mouth all dry but it's not terrible, and (one time, from Hannah Yarber in the grade below him) yeah, I mean she did drop the hook in my mouth at one point but she caught it before it could stab me or fall down my throat, so it wasn't that bad.

All of that was pretty standard, except for that last bit. That last bit was a little spooky. Chris tries not to think about it.

It's not that Chris doesn't want braces because he does. He wants braces because a.) his mom wants him to have braces and b.) he wants healthy teeth. He's just a little. Apprehensive. (And score one for him; thank you, word-of-the-day calendar.)

The waiting room is small and cool and Chris tries not to squirm in his seat too much. There's a two year old a few seats down who looks way more calm than he is and the elderly woman next to him who smells like mint is eying him like he'll jump out of his skin.

Chris is _not_ going to jump out of his skin. Mostly.

He'll admit it. He's not a big fan of pointy things anywhere near his body and especially not inside his mouth. No offense to the very professional doctors using them. He's just not a fan.

So yeah. He's getting braces. He's a little (a lot) jumpy. He's not a fan of hooks and needles in his mouth. It should all be fine though, even though for some reason all Chris can think about is how it'll go wrong and the nurse will drop the hook like she did when Hannah got braces only this time the nurse won't catch it and it'll go down Chris' throat and—

Okay. He needs to calm down.

Did someone leave turn a TV on? Chris can't see any in the waiting room, but there sure is a buzzing that sounds a lot like words somewhere just out of his hearing range. It's a soft noise but the more Chris concentrates on that rather than his own anxiety, the better he feels. The noise even gets a little louder after a minute, like someone turned the dial up. The words become less jumbled and more like real words. He realizes it's a hockey game.

He doesn't catch the names of the teams, but he can hear the sports commentary and he knows it's a game. He looks around again but the TV or radio is nowhere in sight. It doesn't matter though, since Chris can kind of hear it anyway. It's a good sound.

Okay. Breath in, breathe out. He's fine. No nurse or doctor is gonna drop a hook in his mouth or cut his tongue or whatever. They're professionals.

One of the nice ladies calls his name from the counter and then Chris has to follow her to the back and gets in one of the squishy chairs that can lean flat down if the doctor wants it to. For a second his heart starts beating really fast again and his shoulders feel all tight like he hasn't stretched in a while and maybe this isn't the best idea after all.

The hockey commentary cuts in again, louder this time, and Chris can make out the words much better than before. It's a game somewhere in the northeast between the Boston Bruins and some other team he doesn't know. And behind that, for some reason, he can hear the piano. Which is definitely weird to hear on top of the sports scores, but maybe one of the nurses likes letting it play while she works. It's not bad.

The dentist/orthodontist guy comes and they lean him back and shine a bright light in his face but Chris doesn't really pay attention to what's going on very much. He switches between the game and the piano, tuning back and forth between the two for variety and breathes in steady through his nose even though it's kind of hard with all the metal in his mouth. Ew. It helps, though, and Chris is pretty grateful someone left the radio on because it gives him something else to think about.

It feels like he sits there for _forever_ but it's also not as long a forever as he expects. The hockey game cuts out at one point and Chris feels his heart jump for a second because what if they both go away and then there will be nothing to distract him from all the metal bits and pieces being glued in his mouth and oh _no_ —But the piano picks up in its place, clearer than before, though the tune is slower, and Chris closes his eyes and pays attention to that.

The hockey game comes back after another minute of only piano and Chris relaxes even more. It doesn't cut out again after that and suddenly Chris's chair is moving up to a sitting position again before he even realizes he's done. His lips don't catch on the brackets immediately like he half-expects them to and Chris takes that as a good sign. When he runs his tongue over his teeth, he finds the metal kind of intrusive and lumpy, but not terrible. The nurse tells him they went ahead and used blue rubber bands and that's a good color and it's not such a bad time after all.

He's not allowed to chew gum or eat caramel or anything sticky or sugary or _good_ while he has braces and he has to floss his teeth in a special kind of way now, but it's not terrible. Now that he actually has them on, braces aren't that big a deal. It was just putting them on that was the hard part. His mouth's a little sore but the nice nurse who keeps patting his shoulder says it'll go away after a day or so and that seems alright.

The same nurse sneaks him a lollipop reserved for some of the younger kids on the way out but she tells him he deserves it and he's so happy he gives her a full-fledged smile and he forgets for a second he's wearing braces at all.

He misses the end of the hockey game in all the discussion of payment and follow-up appointments, but he hears the last of the music end with a few soft keys and then silence and boy, was Chris lucky to have all that last while he was getting his braces done. He doesn't know a lot about music but it sounded nice and soothing and he loves hockey and what're the odds of those things happening to play while he's at the dentist? How lucky is he?

"Oh!" Chris turns around once before he leaves, because he figures the nurse should know. "Thanks for leaving the radio on and stuff! Or if it wasn't you, please thank whoever else left it on. It really helped!"

She looks at him kind of funny and he's a little nervous a rubber band popped off or something, but when he checks in the car mirror on the way back his braces look fine, so he figures he was just imagining it. His mom gives him that same look all the time.

\---

Chris is seventeen and he's excited to be going to college soon. Also, his right arm really stings. Like, a lot.

Mostly, he is excited. He still won't know about where he got in for another week or so, but he's excited anyway. He sent applications to a community college and a few more local schools. Then a few went out around the country and those are the ones Chris is the most excited about. He has a really, really good feeling about Samwell for some reason. And he has a tour there pretty soon, so he thinks that good feeling might last. Maybe he should look around on Twitter and stuff before he visits though. To get a feel of the land.

Okay, wow, yeah, his arm really hurts. Really bad. Ow. Not even Chris's excitement for the adventure of college can stave off the pain. And usually excitement is the best medicine for everything bad or icky so he's not really sure what to do.

Is it a heart attack? Oh, no. One time he read about how sometimes when guys have heart attacks they can feel it in their arm and stuff before it ever reaches their heart. Is that what's happening? Is he having a heart attack? Can you have heart attacks before you're middle aged? Maybe that thing he read was about girls though; he's not very sure. But the stinging in his arm really can't be good either way. Chris is way too young to have a heart attack. He hasn't even left California yet!

His mom isn't home, but Chris can practically hear her in his ear.

"Sit down," she would say. "Don't be rash. Think about it."

Chris sits down on his bed, slow and steady like his mom would want him to, but he keeps his cell phone on his lap just in case he really is having a heart attack at the tender age of seventeen-about-to-be-eighteen and he needs to call an ambulance.

When Chris sits and closes his eyes and really, really thinks about it, he realizes the stinging in his arm is constant in a rhythmic kind of way. And it was moving. Sometimes it's a bit lower and then a bit higher and then a bit more to the left and then tracing over old lines again and it feels kind of like when he lets some of the other kids in class draw on him with marker sometimes because their pictures are pretty cool, except with more pain.

He wants to fall over in relief. In fact, he does fall down. Chris flops back on his bed and even though it messes up the straightened covers (sorry, mom), he giggles a little anyway, running his tongue over his braces. He feels silly thinking it was a heart attack.

Now that he knows what to look for, it feels more obvious, though it still hurts. He's not having a heart attack, which is a _huge_ relief because he doesn't think he could be a goalie with a bad heart. Also, he likes living.

No, it's not a heart attack. His soulmate was getting a tattoo.

And that's. Well.

Chris hasn't ever really thought about tattoos before. It's never really crossed his mind to get one and he doesn't know anyone that has one.

But if his soulmate has one then right now Chris is thinking tattoos can be pretty cool.

Chris stays on his bed, eyes scrunched up because he's really trying. He's trying to follow the path of the needle on his arm in hopes that maybe he'll be able to figure out the shape. His arm has been hurting for a while though, and that means he probably missed most of the outlining already. Still, he wants to try. Maybe he'll be able to figure out the shape and then he'll actually know _something_ concrete about his soulmate.

That's when Chris's bed starts rocking.

It's so startling he almost opens his eyes, but he knows that if he opens his eyes he might surprise himself in to losing the connection, so he doesn't do that. Even though it's kind of hard because he super wants to check to make sure he's not actually in the water, even though he knows he's not. Chris is having a bit of a déjà vu moment, even though he's not really sure where from. But he guesses that's not really important. What's important is that his bed is rocking.

Chris can literally _smell_ the ocean and he's having more of the déjà vu thing and the whoever is doing the tattoo is still going strong and his bed is rocking.

And that's. Kind of weird? It's not like the ocean is weird. Or tattoos. But Chris doesn't really think you can get tattoos on a boat? Because boats rock and he's pretty sure you need to be really steady in order to draw a tattoo on someone because you can't really fix it if you mess up and boats seem like the worst place to do that kind of thing.

He's pretty sure he's feeling a boat, anyway. If his soulmate were just on the beach, the ground wouldn't rock the way the waves do. So he has to be on something more wobbly. So it's for sure a boat.

It's a little easier to ignore the pain in his arm when he focuses more on the rhythm of the sea, even though that also sucks because that means he's not paying as much attention to the way the tattoo is being drawn and now he won't be able to tell what it is but Chris is also like 87% sure it was a lost cause anyway.

Chris is having a Moment. That's what his Mom calls it when she's on the verge of remembering or saying something and it's right on the tip of her tongue but she can't quite say what she's trying to say or remember.

"I need a Moment," she always says, placing the back of her hand against her forehead and Chris is pretty sure he is having a Moment too.

Moments are hard to have though and he's sure it will fade if he doesn't figure it out fast, so Chris tries really, really hard to focus on the waves and _think._

His soulmate is getting a tattoo (which is totally cool and fine and up to them) but they are also on a boat, which doesn't make sense. Chris is pretty sure he is not imagining the boat. He is also pretty sure he is not wrong about the tattoo. So there's that. Two things that don't really line up. Chris is starting to remember other things that don't really line up too.

Like when he was at the dentist and he hear the hockey game and the piano playing except then the nurse gave him a funny look when he mentioned it. And who would want the TV _and_ the radio playing at work at the same time and overlapping and becoming a jumbled mess of noise anyway? Maybe he hadn't been hearing it at the dentist office at all. Maybe it had been in his head (even though Chris thinking hearing sounds from your soulmate isn't that common at all, he's pretty sure). But then why would his soulmate want the piano and the hockey game playing at the same time anyway? It was distracting. Chris liked it at the time because then he _needed_ distraction, but then who would do that just because they could?

And then Chris thinks of the sea and he thinks of how the waves are rolling him and he also thinks about how sometimes when he's drowsy he feels like he's in one place but also he feels like he's in another place too and neither of those places are his bed and even though he can' t remember what those places are, he's pretty sure he's not wrong about them being different places.

And then he thinks about how _cold_ it is in the winter, every single year, and even when Chris bundles up really nice, it's freezing _all the time_ and how can one person be so cold? He's not sure it's possible. In elementary school he remembers learning how things get bigger or more intense when you multiply them so maybe whoever his soulmate is somehow multiplies their feelings or something to make it double cold in the winter. That doesn't seem very possible.

But then maybe it _is_ possible to be that cold even in winter and his soulmate just lives in, like, Alaska or Russia maybe. So then he's not so sure about that part.

It's a good thing Chris is already lying in bed because his brain feels stuffed and dizzy and he feels like his Moment is fumbling around inside his head and nodding off somewhere else. His arm still aches and the rocking fades and Chris is just alone in his room with a dying thought on the tip of his tongue.

Chris ends up falling asleep after that because his bed is cozy and his house is warm and thinking you're dying takes a lot out of you. Plus, he's not sure what else to do. He dreams and dreams and when he wakes up, he feels confident in a way he sometimes doesn't even though he can't remember what he dreamt about. His arm doesn't hurt anymore.

 _Two,_ he thinks to himself. He doesn't really know where the number comes from. _I have two._

And he doesn't really know what that means or where it came from and maybe thinking you're having a heart attack makes you think other strange stuff too. But for some reason his hands drift to his phone and he's typing his weird, messy thoughts in to Google before he registers anything else, like the fact his mom might be home by now or that the sun is in a different position than before.

The first thing to pop up is the world _polyamory_ and then he Googles that because his word-of-the-day calendar did not have that one yet and then he looks up how that applies to soulmates and there are a bunch of articles he's too sleepy to read in full, but he reads all the titles and Chris thinks, _oh, okay, that sounds right_ and he didn't even know one or any other number sounded _wrong_ but they must be if two sounds _right_.

Sometimes the things he would feel across the soulbond would be so different from the things he felt months and months before that he's wondered if he's not sometimes imagining them because how could one person be doing so many different things all the time? But it would make sense if it were a different person. If it was not one person near the ocean and also near the city doing a bunch of stuff and getting tattoos on boats, but actually two people with separate lives doing separate things in separate places. That would make sense.  

There is definitely a chance he is totally wrong because according to Google, having more than one soulmate is something that happens to maybe 4% of the population of the U.S. and even then there's not really a census or a way to prove that multiple soulmates are a thing yet? So, definitely, he could be wrong.

But Chris doesn't feel wrong. He thinks about it for a second and the thought settles in his chest and all he can think is, _alright, that's how it is._

Which might be a little more subdued than normal, but Chris did just wake up from a nap. He figures he has time to throw a mini-party for himself about it later. (And he will definitely be celebrating later because the back of his mind is already having a blast coming to terms with having two soulmates instead of one and Chris would be up and dancing if it wasn't for the remnants of sleep anchoring his body down.) Two soulmates must also means double the love (he took math, he knows how multiplication works) and that's so cool? Wow.

Maybe now that he's thinking about it a lot more, he'll notice the differences a lot more too. And maybe now he'll remember what he's dreaming about when he dreams of those places that aren't his bed but aren't a real dream either. There are a lot of "maybe's" floating around right now. All of them seem equally amazing.

He hasn't gone anywhere all day and normally on a Saturday Chris would be out and about some more, but he feels like his day has been packed full with doing the dishes and carrying in groceries and bouncing by the mailbox waiting for acceptance letters and then freaking out about graduating high school and then freaking out about a not-heart attack and getting a not-tattoo and then being in water always brings a lot out of him even though Chris hasn't physically been on a boat or near the ocean today. But it feels like he has done all those things and more so he feels like he has had a very long day.

Wow. He wonders if his soulmates (soul _mates_ ) are just as tired as he is. He hopes they're having a really good day too. He hopes he meets them soon.

\---

Chris is eighteen and he is about to take a tour of Samwell.

He looked online and stuff and so far things look just as cool—No, _'swaesome_ (he really hopes he's using that right) as the pictures and articles said. They're not inside Faber Memorial Rink yet (the group has to meet outside first) but already Chris is bursting with excitement. Everything looks so big and new and _neat!_

Chris isn't entirely sure he wants to go here yet but he is hovering somewhere around the 95% range, just saying.

There are a few other guys already there to tour the rink and Chris eyes a few of them. Chris isn't small anymore, so a lot of them are around his height or larger. They all look pretty capable and nice and Chris is pretty excited to meet them all and see who he'd be playing with if he chooses Samwell.

He almost speaks to one guy at random while they're waiting on their tour guide when another catches his eye. Tall, a little over six feet. Redhead. Freckle faced. Flushed for some reason and scuffing his shoes a little, like he isn't sure whether or not to even be here in the first place. This guy is all Chris can look at for almost a full thirty seconds before he lifts his head and notices Chris's starting.

The guy ducks his head and moves away a little like he's about to leave and before Chris even knows what he's doing he throws himself in front of the guy and announces, "Hey! My name's Chris! I'm from California, but I'm really excited to be here at Samwell! I'm not sure I want to go here yet but I'm also kind of sure I do and the hockey team here look really cool! What's your name? What do you play?"

It all comes out in one breath (and he can't help it, he's _excited_ ) and it takes a few seconds before the guy even seems to register that Chris has stuck out his hand. He takes it gingerly, like he's not very sure he wants to touch Chris at all and Chris isn't even offended because sometimes strangers make him nervous too, even though they're usually super old or wearing business suits.

"It's, uh, William," the guy says. "No. I mean. Dex. It's Dex. Defense."

William-Not-William-It's-Dex seems out of his element so Chris feels a little bad. But he also really likes this guy for some reason and he thinks he'll probably be different once he gets to know Chris a little more and if it takes a little more getting-to-know-you than usual he can totally do that. He can also totally tone down his excitement if that's what's bothering Dex. He absolutely can. Maybe.

He'll try.

Another guy walks by just as he opens his mouth to talk to Dex again and for some reason this guy really catches Chris eye too. Same height as Dex, but much darker skin and hair and enough five o'clock shadow that Chris almost thinks he's much older before he really looks at his face and decides, no, this guy really is his age. Chris sees how white his teeth are when he smiles in to his phone and he drags a hand through his hair before putting his hat back on and Chris also really wants to talk to this guy as much as he wants to talk to Dex.

But first Dex is looking at him kind of expectantly and Chris know he'll have time to talk to the other guy later. He's definitely going to seek him out and get his name and find out his hockey position and a bunch of other things. But things have to go in order, so first comes Dex, whose blush is getting marginally darker by the second.

He really, really has a good feeling about Samwell.

(And then he meets Bitty and his pies and he really, really, _definitely_ has a good feeling about Samwell.)

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me on tumblr at someobscurereference.tumblr.com. Feel free to message me there about this fic (series) or anything else. Or leave a comment below!
> 
> *That part where Chowder is getting his braces and he's nervous because a girl told him a nurse once dropped the mouth hook in her mouth is based on an event that happened to me. My dentist lady once dropped the hook in my mouth. It was scary. She said, "Whoops, that could have been bad~" and I was like, yeah, lady, you're telling /me./
> 
> **This series has kind of grown on me a little despite the fact I wrote Chowder porn on a whim at the start two days ago, so I do kind of want to see how I'd write the Dex/Chow/Nurse actually get together part. But also I'm not entirely sure I have Dex and Nursey's voices. The Dex in this fic is based off of how nervous he seemed in the Tadpoles update where he seems not totally in his comfort zone, but I'm more iffy on every day life. I have a few (very vague) maybe ideas but if you guys wanna leave a suggestion/prompt/share literally any thought you've had so far, I totally encourage that in the comments or for you to message me on tumblr. I can't guarantee I'll necessarily use something, but it would be a huge motivator and it will probably spawn off some other idea! Or feel free to talk to me about other CP stuff in general.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


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